


Consumption

by Centarious



Category: Fire Emblem Series, Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Alternate Universe, Angst, F/M, Fluff, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Other Additional Tags to Be Added, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Praise Kink, References to Depression, Romance, Slow Burn, Smut, Spoilers, War, psychological damage
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-03
Updated: 2020-01-03
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:15:20
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22096231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Centarious/pseuds/Centarious
Summary: Imbued and merged with Sothis from birth, Byleth is raised within the monastery to hone her powers and remain safe. She is treated with all the respect of a goddess; hardly touched, never spoken against. All of Fodlan looks to her with reverent eyes. All, save for the Empire, who after years of preparation have set the stage for their war against the church. For five years she is safe within Rhea's walls, but no longer when a siege is laid against her home. Forcing their hand, Byleth is sent to Faerghus for protection where she meets the ever-elusive King Dimitri, a man more interested in being reclusive than being reverent.Byleth tries to change that.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/My Unit | Byleth
Comments: 36
Kudos: 218





	Consumption

Byleth had known the little girl chained to the throne all her life. 

Today she was silent, bouncing her crossed legs and jingling the manacles that connected them to a dreary tune, matching the faint, otherworldly beat of drums and languageless chanting that echoed from the black beyond. The void their endless chain slinked from stairway led dais to a nothingness neither Byleth nor the girl dared journey. Not anymore at least.

Huddled against the cold stone throne, knees pressed to her chest, waiting was all Byleth could do to pass the time in the place where it never did. She was used to this game of silent waiting, interrupted only by the little one's thoughtful musings or an announcement that they shall play a game of some sort. 

Byleth was not very good at the games; the ones about describing the earth or what the ground smelled like. Dirt she'd said once. Nothing she'd said another. The chained one was never happy with those answers. 

Sothis crossed her legs over again and let out a short breath of air. The jingling fell out of tempo with the rising tempo of the drums.

Something was coming. 

Byleth could feel it her bones, recycled and jittering in this place between sleep and awakeness, something roused within her chest. Something she did not understand.

With Sothis' first bout of major movement in weeks, she rose from her throne, a splitting, eye creasing smile cracking across her face as she stood in front of Byleth, hands on her hips. 

"Get up, get up," she called, hoisting Byleth up off her feet with ease. "It is finally time," she said, dusting Byleth off and rising onto her tiptoes to slick back a piece of her hair. "After two decades it is finally time."

Finger clasped, she let out a giddy breath. "Oh child, I have awaited this day with such excitement," she announced, bouncing on her heels. "Finally-" she closed her eyes, hands clenching together- " _finally,_ we will be _free_."

Byleth cocked her head, a mimic of the confusion she was meant to feel. Meant but did not. Could not. "What is today?"

Mischief and joy unadulterated shimmered behind her eyes. She dropped back into her throne. 

"Awaken and see for yourself."

* * *

"Wake up- Wake up-" Byleth jolted back, banging against the headboard at the foreign feeling of hands against her shoulders, shaking her violently. Rhea's wide crazed eyes bore into Byleth with the strength her trembling fingers did. "It is time," she said, breathless. "We must leave _now_." Byleth needed no clarification.

Adrestia was here.

She swung her legs over the side of their shared bed, bare feet hitting cold stone. 

"Get our things," Rhea commanded, "I will open the passageway." Byleth nodded, barely moving out of the way before Rhea shoved the bed to the side, four posters scraping against the wall before they collapsed. She rushed to the globe in the corner of the room, muscle memory kicking in before her eyes could, and searched blindly for the switch. Pressing hard against the button, the globe popped open, top half clattering to the ground below. Byleth reached within and snatched the two packs hidden inside.

A screech tore through the air moments before an explosion did. Byleth was thrown off her feet, barely avoiding the balcony doors as they flung open and into the floor, shattering from the force like shattering glass. Before she had time to recover, to even take in a breath another explosion farther off rattled through the thick stone walls of the monastery. Sulfer smoke and pebbles rained from above, burning her eyes.

Then the keening began. Long, drawn-out noises of grief as Byleth coughed away the horrid taste of gunpowder rubbed at her eyes. She opened them to the sound of another scream closer now- that sung into the night before cutting off. 

Golden light assaulted her from all angles, drenching the room in painful brightness that only her shadow tore through, pointing a blotchy, accusatory finger towards the horrors outside the open balcony.

Byleth knew she shouldn't have looked. She was taught endlessly from the day the war started, that when this day came- when it was time to evacuate- she was never to look back. She was never to hesitate and take in the horrific beauty of her home, burning and crumbling around her. 

With large, open eyes, she watched from her place on the floor as the cathedral's first tower began to lean, the old stone groaning in pain before a deathly crack whipped through the air. The bridge and people below had no time to run before it swooped down, severing the monastery from its place of worship like scissors to a string.

Rhea wrenched her from the ground. "What did I tell you," she hissed, yanking her to her feet, "We haven't the time to mourn this place." She shoved Byleth back, forcing her towards the wall, a dark spiral of stairs replacing where the bed once was. Harsh, orderly yelling sounded bellow them. "Quickly," Rhea whispered. "We must go quickly!"

Byleth hurried down the stairs, looking back only to assure Rhea had followed. A harsh bang sounded on the bedroom door while she stalled, watching as Rhea pulled down the trap door and locked it tight, just barely before the sound of broken hinges filled the hole.

"Down there!" A muted, feminine voice called. 

Rhea snatched her arm and bolted down the stairs. 

"Faster-" she urged. "Faster-" As another explosion sounded. She dragged Byleth down the final set of stairs, and through the mud bellow, slippery and moist as it squelched between Byleth's toes. She scrambled to her feet to nearly be pulled down as Rhea herself fell. Byleth hoisted her up, rushing in beat to the pounding of the trapdoor above.

A small kernel of fire erupted from Byleth's palm in hopes to save them from any more falls. Water silken walls reflected a circle of light around them exposing the aged endless expanse of catacombs. Rhea snuffed her fire as soon as it emerged, taking her hand and holding it tight between her own.

"We can't risk them seeing us," she said, flinching as a crack filled the tunnel. Panic, real and violent panic flashed through Rhea's eyes as they raced.

"Let me turn back time," Byleth whispered as they rounded a corner, foreign sloshing steps gaining on them. "I can reset our day- this will never happen-"

"No." Rhea pulled Byleth into an offshoot of the main tunnel, the walls hugging her shoulders as they shuffled through. "They've been preparing this for months- years maybe- this will happen no matter what we do."

Rhea held Byleth's hand tighter and turned down another alcove, and then another, weaving in and out of tunnels and high crawlspaces till the sound of following footsteps grew louder and yelling of their tracks grew closer. Till there was a rickety old ladder at a dead end.

Looking up, Byleth saw it as an endless climb. Needing no instruction she clamored up, Rhea following closely behind.

"This way!" A male voice called, "The tracks lead here-"

Byleth climbed as fast as her limbs would allow, racing up, up, up into the darkness, reaching blindly for rung after rung.

"Up there, they've climbed the ladder-" A yelp escaped Byleth as she slipped, breaking a line of the damp wood as she fell, barely being caught and brought back up by Rhea and forced to keep moving.

"I heard them!" Another voice called. "Quickly, tear it down!"

"Up up!" Rhea hissed, pushing at Byleth's legs, "We're almost there!"

Byleth looked up, squinting at the sight of golden light, winking through the broken boards of an exit, just wide enough for a body to slip through. She hauled herself up, nearly leaping each rung until she found purchase in a stone rim and pulled herself over, rolling into a patch of grass before hurrying back to the hole, reaching out a hand to help.

The ladder swayed as Rhea rose, racing upwards with all the speed she could manage of a before latching onto Byleth's hand. With the crack of the crumbling ladder, Byleth hoisted Rhea over the edge, barely escaping in time as it collapsed down into the gorge.

They tumbled into the thicket of grass, the dead, sharp blades digging into Byleth shoulders how she imagined the swords of her assailants would have. Just how all those practice daggers did as Rhea prepared her for this very night, rousing her from sleep to be sure she was always ready.

And yet, in the face of the siege they all knew would one day come, not even Rhea had been fully prepared. In the end, they all, as they caught their breath, looked back at their burning home and paused.

Paused at the sight of the large, endless inferno that streaked across the sky.

Byleth watched as Rhea's eyes took in the sight, large and unfathoming as she watched her home of centuries burn to ash. She watched as she steeled herself moments later, tearing her eyes away from the atrocity as though she could stand it no longer.

"We should move on while we have the time," Rhea breathed, rising to her feet. "Seteth and the knights should be waiting for us." She helped Byleth to her up. 

A question burned in her throat, strong but unspeakable.

_How many even survived?_

Rhea took her hand and squeezed it tight. The touches, both urgent and gentle were... foreign, odd things from Rhea, but comforting in spite of the chaos. Able to quell the unfamiliar tightness in Byleth's chest. "Come," she said, "let's go before the search parties widen their gaze." And set off into the woods. 

The journey from there was easier, the only obstacle the rocks that pierced Byleth's feet or the echo of the explosions and heat that still radiated from the monastery. Like within the darkness, here, all she could do was wait for them to pass.

Wait until they came upon a clearing in the woods, filled with chuffing, blindfolded horses, and shell shocked knights. 

"Rhea?" A mature, familiar voice called. Seteth pushed passed a group of men and rushed forward, a world of relief covering his face. "Thank the goddess you both are all right."

"And you, my friend, " Rhea said, letting go of Byleth to step forward, a grim, dark expression shadowing her features. The fires of war backlit her resolve. "What do we know so far," she asked.

Seteth set his jaw, old, timeless features pulled into a deep frown teeming with as much grief as there was anger. "This isn't just a seize, Rhea, this is an entire assault." He let out a sharp breath. "Their goal must not just be to take you and Byleth but to destroy the monastery and it's residents entirely."

An echoed memory of a cut-off scream played within Byleth's mind.

Rhea's eyes bore into Seteth, a horrible, hard expression on her face. And with a voice soft as air, she asked a most dangerous question. 

"And has it?"

Seteth's eyes fell and he was quiet a long, long while. "It seems to be so," he murmured. Rhea let out a shivering breath, hands clenching at her side. "There is no telling how many monks will make it to the rendezvous point, nor if the enemy soldiers will find them along the way, but I will swear to you, Rhea, with every fiber of what I am, when I arrive, when I see who remained, be it a single child or every person we thought to have lost, I will protect each one till my last breath."

She nodded, a stiff secure promise bargained and accepted. 

"Then-... then, it seems we must move on to allow you and the others to assist the faithful." She swallowed, eyes drifting to Byleth. "Would you give Byleth and I a moment alone?"

Seteth nodded. "It has been a pleasure, your grace," he said softly, "you know where to write me if need be. The both of you do." To a little town east of Myrdin, hidden within the mountains. 

With a low bow, he left to the horses, readying and checking them one last time, no doubt, and motioned to Flayn to assist him. The girl glanced at Byleth and gave her a solemn wave good-bye. 

She turned back as Rhea took her hands, rubbing a gentle circle around her thumb. Greif laid plain in her eyes despite her soft, gentle smile.

"You've mud on your cheek," she murmured, wiping it away with her finger. "There..." She took in a breath, examining Byleth for a long, quiet moment. "The people in Faerghus will treat you well, dear one. Its people are a strong, valiant breed with as much faith as you or I." She smoothed down the ruffles in Byleth's nightgown. "Its king and his subjects will take care of you. That much, of all things, I can promise." Rhea's smile weakened, her resolve faltering as another explosion boomed in the distance.

She took in a long breath and glanced behind Byleth, at the destruction that reflected in her eyes. "Fight for them if they need you," she said. "Hold your ground if they challenge you. And never lose sight of what you are to these people." Not a who. Not a person or human, but a what. A thing. "You are above them," she said, eyes dark, brewing with something. "Do not allow yourself to stoop to their level."

Rhea flinched as another boom sounded in the distant, as piercing as an infant's cry. Tensing, she released a shuddering breath and let uncertain eyes fall undivided upon Byleth. Byleth squeezed back her trembling hands ever so slightly, easing an unsteady smile from the woman. 

"Archbishop, Your Grace," Catherine called. "We must hurry before the soldiers come looking for us. 

Rhea nodded, before turning back to Byleth. "I suppose this is good-bye then," she murmured. Her eyes fell to the dirt, shame, and innocence, all the same, swam beneath that aged gaze. "Call me by my real name, one last time, before you go, please," she requested. 

Byleth swallowed down the hard ball that formed in her throat. "Good-bye Serios," Byleth whispered. 

Rhea closed her eyes tight, grip slackening on Byleth. "Good-bye... Sothis." And let go of her, turning towards her black stallion without looking back and mounted. There was no fanfare as she left, no longing yell, or whip of reigns. There was only the beat of hooves that grew farther and farther away until that spot of green hair was no more.

"Your Grace," Alois called from beside her, his booming voice dulled to a somber murmur, "It is time to go." 

And after a long moment of looking, staring after the woman that had been by her side since birth gone without a second glance, she turned to him and nodded. Something lulling and heavy weighed her down as she trudged to her horse and pulled herself up. Swinging over her leg over and pulling down her nightdress, she settled into the saddle, aware that it would be a long, cold ride to Fhirdiad. 

"Ready?" A woman, new to the knights by the name of Shamir asked, leather armor stained with blood and whitened with plaster dust. All she could do was nod, tongue a thick worm in her throat. She turned back to her entourage, much bigger than Rhea's and called to them, loud enough to be heard and quiet enough to be secretive from those they wished to avoid. "We ride through the mountains to Charon territory where we will rendezvous with Lord Fraldarius. There will be no stops. There will be no time to slow. Her grace's life depends on our speedy and stealthy arrival, do you understand?"

A chorus of affirmation rung through the group. Shamir nodded. "Then we ride." And with the snap of her reigns, she set off into the woods, half the men following her, the other half waiting to gallop behind Byleth. She looked back one last time- looked to the remnant of her home, nothing more than kindling to the Adrestian Empire. She snapped her reigns before the pain could break through the surface of the water.

* * *

It was a long night through the mountains, the journey a dangerous task but necessary. Even on the thin paths carved out centuries before Byleth had ever come into this world there were countless pitfalls and little holes that could cost a horse's ankle, or worse, a soldier's life. Even slowed to a crawl it would be easy to fall off the cliffs and tumble into the valleys below. It didn't help that they raced through the cliffsides with as much speed as they could manage. 

Horses slipped and whinnied at every corner, barely keeping their hold on the stone, moist from the earlier rain. Men and women held tight to their reigns, hunkering down close to the horses in hopes to have a better grip so close to their death. Byleth was not shocked when she'd heard the first horse fall, whinnying and crying as it slipped from the side of the hill and barreled down, it's rider barely jumping off in time to save himself. 

The second rider was not so lucky.

Byleth held her reigns a little tighter after that, her mind prickling with a soft little request. 

_Turn back time. Save him._

But she was not allowed to, not without Rhea's permission. 

The little girl in her dreams had always hated that rule, had spat at the ground every time Rhea warned her not to test fate. _"How could she know,"_ Byleth had asked as a child. 

_"Do not try her, little one, she is stronger than you imagine."_

And she had been right. Byleth was never sure how, but Rhea had always known when she twisted back the hands of time whether it be as a child to retaste a delicious meal or to get out of trouble after skipping a prayer session. Where the hands of time reversed stood archbishop Rhea swift with her punishment. Whether it be extra training, extra prayer times or extra time spent alone in their room, regardless of her crime, her dues were always paid in full.

And in the end, Byleth knew Rhea would not waste energy upon a single man. 

So, she quieted the voice that begged for her to save him and did not look to the saddened gazes of the soldiers around her, sure that she had reversed time a million times in hopes of saving their friend only to find it fruitless. They always had a tendency to assume things, her people.

They assumed she was good at every hobby she picked up without meticulous training whether it be for needlework and painting or sparing and tactics. They assumed she knew every inch of the world's history and its formation without the help of ancient books and rulers snapping at her fingers as a child. They assumed she could help everyone- assumed she could save every person who needed saving.

And when one was born merged with the progenitor god, there were always things to be assumed. No matter how untrue they were. 

In her mind, there was little fanfare to her reality, no blaring trumpets or booming drums despite the ones played in her ceremonies, only a somber, quiet awareness that Byleth was different from those around her. A fact that she was not allowed the things the normal people were allowed. No toys as a child, nor children to play with. No books to read that were not approved by Rhea first or outings to the market.

But to the world, her unexpected arrival was a different story. She was not the woman who spent her childhood in reclusion and slept restlessly each night, shackled to the same being she was merged with. She was the goddess reborn, a blessed babe who had been raised from the monastery balcony and heralded to the world. A perfect child who heard prayers and kissed rings. A godly woman who led prayer to herself, and brought hope through the endless war that surrounded them, her eyes mature with something they thought was otherworldly power. 

Something Byleth knew was what made her... different. What even in reverent prayers from monks and peasants, faithful to a fault, made them uncomfortable. Made them shrink in her presence and escape her dead gaze as fast as possible.

It was something that made her _wrong._ Made her inhuman- if she was ever human, to begin with. Rhea would always say no, ending the conversation before Byleth could ever inquire more, no doubt the prospect sacrilegious, yet... Byleth still wondered some nights. Before sleep stole her to the dark place, she wondered if she ever could be human. And then, wondered, why with all the fanfare and praise and golden gifts and things why she would ever want to. Why it would ever be the one thing she craved with all the clarity of the blue sky above.

She supposed she'd never know.

She supposed she would never need to know. 

Her fingers carded against the gray main of her mare and looked down at the gorge beside her. The skid marks of the horse and rider who had fallen only moments before reached out to her like the hands of the faithful. She looked away before that voice came back and braced herself for the long night ahead. For the countless more men who would fall and the countless more little voices, she could not always stop her ears for. 

And waited like always for the fresh dawn that awaited them, long as it was, but a refreshing sight as they passed through the final crags of the mountain and onto soft, stable grass. Their first steps into Faerghus, the chill already strong against Byleth's bare arms and grew only stronger as they picked up the pace toward Charon territory, closer now with the mountains behind them, galloping until grassy plains turned to a frigid, frostbitten place, so cold the grass crunched beneath the horses' hooves.

Baring against the cold winds in nothing but a borrowed cloak from a soldier and her nightgown, Byleth imagined a warm fire and a cup of tea- imagined Rhea's teapots, shattered on the floor and the roiling blaze of the monastery licking at her heels, the scent of smoke still clinging to her.

She snuffed out the thoughts as quickly as they came and shivered through the morning ride, letting her mind freeze over until they arrived.

It wasn't until near midday when Shamir's midnight mare fell behind in the group, slowing to a trot beside Byleth's horse. Byleth straightened in her saddle, back aching after huddling to the creature for warmth the past few hours.

"Your grace," she greeted with a small bow of her head. "We'll be coming upon the rendezvous point soon. From there, we will leave you in the hands of the kingdom."

"For how long," Byleth asked.

"For as long as this bloody war lasts." And when the war had gone on for five years with no push in either direction until now, that may as well have been forever.

The group turned past an abandoned carriage into a line of conifer trees. 

"It has been a pleasure serving you, for as short a time as it was," Shamir said, nodding to her before moving up the pack and leading them as they broke through the small forest and into a hilly, stumpy clearing.

There, laid the banner of Blaiddyd, a proud silver lion on a backdrop of blue, the colors of her savior and the church's greatest ally in the war against them. The war against Sothis. 

The war against Byleth.

And there were traces of that war in every corner of the clearing. From the fur and silver-clad soldiers sheathing their weapons to her entourage that parted like a wave as Byleth rode forward, these finals steps her journey and no one else. She saw the war most in the tired, unfamiliar men, travel-weary and reverent as they lowered to their knees, as they dropped their heads and made another deadly assumption that it was what Byleth wanted.

She rode past Shamir and watched as the woman gave her a short nod. _This is all you now._ It said. Not with Rhea's guidance, nor Seteth's. Not with mouths to speak for her. This was now for Byleth and Byleth alone to lead, to play her part.

Her horse came to a stop at the cusp of the two groups and overlooked the soldiers, well armored, and capable by the looks of it. Good.

"Rise," she commanded, skin-crawling at the sight of so many kneeling before her. A chorus of clanking metal drifted through the air as the tens of men and women rose, posture rigid, eyes set straight, but avoiding her gaze, looking as far away from her as possible. She swallowed. "Where is Lord Fraldarius?"

"Here, Your Grace," a strong, vibrant voice called. Byleth's eyes flicked towards the movement as the crowd shifted to allow a man on horseback to push through. Deep violet hair and warm eyes greeted her as Lord Fraldarius stopped in front of her. He smiled warmly despite the cold. "It is an honor to be in your presence. I pray your journey was well?"

"It wasn't," she said plainly. "Too cold."

His smile only grew. "It will only get colder from here, Your Grace, you've yet to even see the snow." Byleth's patience for Faerhus soured a tick. "We'll find you some warmer clothes to wear on this next leg of our journey. Perhaps I can brief you of such?"

"You may on the road," she said. Though no large groups of empire troops would risk following into Faerghus, there was still risk of small, faster groups, disguised as traders or journeymen that could easily outnumber Byleth and take her down. Though she'd been well trained in combat, she knew from her exercises that despite her strength she could only take on three men at once and barely. Any more than that and she was a goner. 

The risk of waiting any longer to depart meant it was time to move on. 

She turned to her entourage, patiently waiting as they guarded the entrance to the clearing. Countless men were without horses having lost them on the journey through the mountains. They'd resorted to sharing steeds when the group could not risk slowing for them. One of them, the first man to fall and survive had twisted his ankle on the jump from his horse. It was bad enough to keep him from walking. 

She glanced to Lord Fraldarius. "Will I need my horse, or have you provided one?"

"We have you arranged to be seated in a carriage." That would explain the one abandoned outside of the clearing. 

She nodded and hopped from her mare before grabbing her pack off its back. One of her own knights stepped and took the reigns, but she stopped him, grasping them before he could get too far. 

He looked to her, uncertainty flashing in his eyes before he averted his gaze. 

"Give this one to the injured man," she ordered, letting him leave. She addressed the group around her, that last remnant of the monastery that she'd spent her whole life in. 

Maybe, had she been any other thing, she would have given a speech- would have known how to encourage these battered down people and raise their spirits. She maybe could have blessed them with those gifts they assumed she had, let them touch their goddess reborn for the first and only time and done something else than the simple words she'd spoken. 

But Byleth was a plain, simple woman. She did not like speaking. She did not like touch nor reverent prayer. So she did all she could. Said all she knew. 

"You may leave now."

Shamir snapped her reigns only a moment after, nodding towards Byleth in a gruff, subtle good-bye before galloping away, not bother to see if the others followed. One by one, like sand through a funnel the final grains of soldiers filed out until the only monastery bred person left was her. Until there was no one left from home but her. 

But it wasn't home anymore, was it? No... Faerghus was home now, and it would be, it seemed for a long time.

She turned back to Lord Fraldarius, now off his towering horse he stood beside her, a stable tall beacon of warmth that tore through her shivering- the trembling that seemed to come from within rather than the cold. He unclipped the cloak that clung to his shoulders and offered it to Byleth. 

"You will need it more than I will, Your Grace," he said softly. Looking after the gone knights solemnly, though she couldn't understand why. She took his cloak and wrapped it around herself, skin seeming to debristle at the feeling of the soft wool that cradled her frame. A breath left her lips. 

"Thank you," she said quietly.

"There are no thanks needed. It's practically decoration with how warm it is down here." Her brows furrowed. Byleth was by no means unused to cold weather. The monastery was prone to harsh, chilly winds and thick layers of snow thanks to its place on a mountain, but even she was shivering after only a short time here. He motioned for her and the others to follow and began leading his horse out of the clearing. "You will see once we get to Fhirdiad," he said. "It only ever gets warm enough to melt the snow. We've not seen a proper warm summer in a decade."

Byleth pulled the cloak in closer. Though it boded unwell for her personal comfort, it was at least another obstacle between her and the empire. When in the face of safety, her comfort had never much mattered, but that was the way of life.

They broke out of the path and back onto the main road, where Lord Fraldarius guided Byleth to the carriage, already being prepped and hooked up to the horses. He opened the door for her and she climbed within, settling onto plush, satin seats. Though he did not follow her, he remained outside the door, keeping it open as his group readied her for the next leg of their journey.

"It won't be long to Fhirdiad from now. We've direct access to the main roads and intend to make use of them." He motioned to the roads ahead. "We should arrive at Castle Fhirdiad before sunset today, there you shall meet with the king unless you have qualms with it."

"Why did he not join you," she asked. Something in his easy expression stiffened. Though, It faded just as quickly as it came. 

"He did not think it appropriate to leave the palace. The risk of a mirrored attack was too great to ignore."

"No attack any time soon will mirror what has befallen the monastery," she said. "So your people have nothing to worry about."

He smiled a proud, reassured thing, "With you within our walls, we will no doubt be blessed with good fortune."

She let out a soft breath. "One would assume, wouldn't they?"

He was quiet a moment, examining her with an expression she could not quite describe. He hummed quietly. "Indeed, one would," he said, "but one may never ask if they should." Byleth blinked at the unexpected words. He bowed. "Good day, your grace." And closed the door. Byleth stared out the window after him as he mounted his horse and called for the group to begin their treck. 

The carriage jostled as the horses began to move. 

Byleth laced her fingers together. 

What an odd man.

* * *

The hills of Faerghus rolled by with the lull of a cloud across the sky, but to Byleth, all she saw was the subtle shift from cold, frozen grass to snowy plains to thick ice, blazing yellow in the setting sun. Byleth's eyes fell from the sight of large, imperial-looking walls and switched instead to her hands. They were adorned with rings, replica's of the ones Sothis once wore centuries before, just as her outfit. She'd even braided the ribbons in her hair, finding comfort in the semblance of the routine she would have had today.

Firey light flitted through the carriage. She tightened the cloak.

They'd chosen Saint Serios day to attack. Not the day before in the chaos of setting up extra protection nor the day after, slackened in the wake of booze despite the holy day. They had chosen today, in spite of the extra hoops and the extra steps- as if their message wasn't potent enough- as if destroying it all- as if massacring enough to make even a pulse of reversed time be pointless wasn't enough.

Byleth's jaw trembled, tightened and ground out the suffocating, all-encompassing _thing_ that beat on the walls of her chest. The thing that flashed the smell of sulfur and the sounds of cut off screams and whinnying horses. The thing that rained phantom pebbles on her skin and radiated the heat of a blazing inferno. 

The thing that she did not want to feel. 

She jumped as the door to her still moving carriage opened, slow enough to allow her to reach for a dagger but fast enough to reveal Lord Fraldarius as he climbed in. She sheathed it before he could see and turned to face him. 

A knowing smile, all the same, warmed his pale features. "We are safe here Your Grace, though I apologize for startling you." She accepted his apology with a nod. "I thought it would be proper to tell you that we have arrived in Fhirdiad and are on our way to the castle now." He pulled back a window drape and peered out. "We should be there any minute now, in fact."

"I will be meeting the king, correct?" she asked, glancing outside as the carriage slowed through a checkpoint. 

The drop of the drape cut off her view as he turned back to her, nodding. "Yes. We sent our messengers up ahead an hour ago. His majesty and subjects should be ready to greet you upon our arrival."

"And after that?"

"After that, you are free to do as you please. The servants may show you around if you'd like, or simply take you to your rooms and find you something to eat."

"And tomorrow?"

Amusement flitted across his lips. "As I said before you are free to do as you please." 

But she furrowed her brow. Confusion welling in her gut. "You do not expect anything of me?" she asked. She was used to her schedule always being prepared for her once she'd woken up. Rhea had always run over all her duties for the day before they started, and expected a strict following of it. It was only natural they would expect the same. "No schedules or rituals to perform?"

He mirrored her puzzlement. "Ah, no." he said. "Why would we impose silly rules and schedules upon the goddess incarnate, no less a visitor and refugee. Your time is your own here."

But before she could inquire more a voice called from outside, "We've arrived Lord Fraldarius."

He sat his hands onto his thighs, hitting them lightly. "Well, your grace, do you object to leaving this stuffy carriage to meet his majesty?" he asked, moving to hold the door handle. 

Well, she wouldn't object to that. "You may lead the way." With a nod, he pushed open the door. Byleth slipped out, careful not to touch the man as she slipped around him and down the step. Icy cobblestone, layered in a thin fall of snow pressed against her bare feet. Her shadow stretched forward, stretched towards a towering, sunset haloed castle tinted golden in the low light. Her lips parted, breath stolen at such an imposing, large structure. 

Ice crunched beside her as Lord Fraldarius stepped down. He clasped his hands behind his back, his posture the definition of pride. "Stunning, isn't it?" Stunning was not the right word. No, shocked or... surprised would do it. That she would be staying in here, rather in the humble, smaller abode she'd imagined of Faerghus' castle... it was a new, unexpected amount of information to take in. She had half the mind to apologize for downgrading it so in her mind's eye. Though Sothis had told her dream a little bigger on the occasion she thought of possibly going to this place. To think it would come so much sooner than anyone expected.

Lord Fraldarius stepped past her, and wordlessly she joined him. A group of knights fell in step behind her, adding an extra layer of protection as they entered through a large open door, burrowing through the thick walls. 

Warmth and expense blasted her the moment she stepped within, no doubt the work of a fire spell and a handful of weighty purchases. She paid little mind to the ornate vases and proud suits of armor that lines the walls of the entrance hall, focusing more on the little doors and hallways that jutted out, the servants and knights who ducked out of sight the moment they noticed her enterourage and the striking blue banners that hung from the high ceiling. 

Her fingers ached imagining all the time it took to embroider them.

"This place is filled to the brim with anything you may need," Lord Fraldarius said, following the trail of the blue and silver carpet that stretched below them and up a line of stairs. "We've the largest library in northern fodlan, a chapel, an open kitchen, and countless servants who would love to help you." They rounded a corner and began up a large stairwell. "You are free to roam any part and the town below- though we would prefer if you took a knight with you before you did so." The rounded another corner revealing a long hallway marked with large double doors at the end. 

"In short, your grace," he said as they approached, dull chatter wafting through the doors. He motioned ahead for two stationed soldiers to open the doors. "Faerghus welcomes you."

And with such warmness from only a subject, she couldn't fathom the warmness that would come from its king, no doubt another vice to the cold weather from the outside. 

Soundlessly, the doors opened, and the knights at her back turned to align themselves symmetrically at her side, with a nod goodbye Lord Fraldarius fell behind, calling out, "Sothis Reborn, Her Grace Sothis Byleth Eisner."

Any chatter that had gone on before silenced at the announcement of her name, and Byleth eyed a group of men, women, knights and nobles lining the halls, all in varying states of formal attire. All in varying states of awe as she passed by. 

Her eyes slipped forward to where the carpet ended and the stairs to the dais began. Where a large, foreboding man stood at the cusp of a golden throne, canopied by blue curtains. The knights stopped as she drew near, rising upon the dais with as much grace as she could muster. Rising and stopping still at the sight of Faerghus' king, handsome no doubt, but very, very _wrong_.

Clad in dark armor and heavy furs, there was no warmth to be found in the man that stood before her, not in his protective, stiff stance, not in his hands, clenched tight and especially not in his eyes- or eye she should say, icy and pinned upon like she was nothing more than a worm before him. An intruder. 

There was a darkness that stirred there, something hard and unforgiving that wafted from those eyes like a dark miasma and dried out her mouth like salt, suffocating her like the smoke of the monastery had.

She rose her chin, swallowing back her thick tongue and stirring blood. His eye narrowed as he took in a sharp breath, jaw setting before he lowered to a knee. And she watched in horrific awe as he took her hand between his own, iron-clad fingers in a grip that was too tight to be anything but comforting- too tight to ever be able to offer comfort and slowly leaned forward.

Warm, soft lips pressed against her hand, their delicate, hesitant movement seeping into her cold skin. Warmth, something unfamiliar and... and odd bloomed in her chest at such touch. 

One cold, icy eye slipped up to meet her own. Hard, heated hatred lurked beneath them as he spoke. 

"His Royal Majesty, King Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd welcomes you to Faerghus," he spat.

But she felt anything but welcomed. 


End file.
